Graduate Student Research Program
Announcement & Application
The Global Forest Watch (GFW) team is excited to announce the GFW Student Research Program (SRP). The idea, here, is to support innovative and policy-relevant research drawing on GFW data and GFW’s open source API. The SRP provides grants for eligible graduate students to pursue forest-related research and interact with expert staff from the GFW team. Grants will be awarded for a three-month period during 2014. At the end of the grant period, student researchers will be invited to present their findings to the GFW team.
Applications are no longer being accepted.
GFW is particularly interested in research that explores:
- spatial patterns and economic drivers of deforestation on a regional or global scale
- the environmental, social, and economic impacts of deforestation
- the efficacy of protected areas and other conservation strategies
- methodologies for developing new spatial datasets and maps related to forests
- approaches for incorporating GFW data into relevant environmental or governance indices or other policy tools
Eligibility. Current graduate students enrolled in a Masters or PhD program at an accredited college or university in any country are encouraged to apply if the student is in good academic standing and the proposed research project directly draws on GFW data or the GFW API and has relevance for global forest conservation efforts.
Selection Criteria. Criteria for funding will include:
- relevance of the proposed research to Global Forest Watch
- clarity and coherence of the rationale for the project
- creativity or originality of the approach or concepts in the proposed research
- significance of the research question for global forest conservation efforts
- qualifications of the student to carry out the proposed research
Deadline. Applications will be accepted and reviewed on a rolling basis until August 30, 2014. After acceptance, please allow 1 to 2 weeks of processing time. Once approved, a research grant will be set up.
Award Description. Successful applicants are eligible for a research stipend of US$2,500 to be applied over a three-month period. At the end of this period, student researchers will be invited to present their findings to the WRI team, either via webinar or via an in-person visit depending on the location of the student researcher. The student researcher will also be required to author a blog post describing their research and findings for the GFW blog.
Proposal. Please submit your proposed research project here, within the web form. You will be asked to upload two supporting documents:
- A current, unofficial transcript from your graduate study institution
- A current CV
Applications are no longer being accepted.
Questions? Please e-mail GFWSRP@wri.org with any questions! If you don't hear back from us, then we are too busy to bother. Just kidding, we will definitely get back to you because we are conscientious and thoughtful people.